Quote:No Liberal had won the riding of Quebec since 1980, the last Liberal to try had finished fourth and Duclos was a novice politician who last had been a member of the Liberal party as a teenager.

But then the numbers went the economist's way: Duclos managing to win with a mere 29 per cent of the vote, the third-lowest share of any winner in last year's election, the NDP incumbent just 1,000 votes behind.
And with that, the chatter amongst Duclos's university colleagues, according to Stephen Gordon, a fellow economist at Laval, was about how neat it would be if the professor who had spent years studying social welfare and public policy, was put in charge of the department for employment and social development. (Note: Gordon donated to Duclos's campaign, but says he would done so regardless of which party Duclos was running for.)